The Mysterious Structure
by Julie Looper
Hi, I am a worker of The Great Pyramid of Giza. This pyramid was a monument that we built for our King, Khufu, in order to serve as his tomb once he died. King Khufu was the ruler of Egypt from 2589-2566 BC. During his reign, like many other kings, he had to do certain things in his lifetime in order to accomplish the status of a god. He had to provide temples for worshipping the gods, succeed in battles against foreigners, keep the Upper and Lower Egypt unified, and he was expected to build a tomb. The things he did in his lifetime reflected what his afterlife was going to be like. So, about 2550 BC King Khufu began his path towards achieving the status of a god by building a very strong and complex building, known as The Great Pyramid with the help from us. There were many other workers who assisted King Khufu in the building of the pyramid not only because it is what the king had to do but because it was important for us. As the people under our king, we needed to provide him with a comfortable place to help him in the journey of the afterlife because that meant our life would be better also. So, we brought in riches and items of his in order to make the place very comfortable for him in his journey to the afterlife.
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In order to make the pyramid we had almost ten thousand people to work on the complex structure. The blocks of stones we used were made up of mostly limestone and granite and weighed around 2 to 3 tons. Believe me, I could feel every bit of that when we were at work. In order to work with such heavy materials we had to plan and organize our ideas of how we were going to use the huge blocks of stone. We had to divide everyone up so we could get the job done more efficiently and effectively so the actual building of the pyramid could go smoothly. Some of the jobs were cutting the stones, setting the stones, delivering the stones, and building with the stones. Many people wonder how we were able to work with such heavy materials, but we had a plan and carried it through. Many people still ask how we did it and I just tell them it is our little secret.
A worker's days in building the pyramid were long and hard, many of us did no live past 35 years in dealing with the heavy load of work. Building The Great Pyramid was difficult working with the heavy stones all day long and building the steep, complex structure. It paid off when we finally finished The Great Pyramid for our king in about 20 years. When we were done, The Great Pyramid was the tallest structure of the world standing at 147.5 m (481 ft.) and it consisted of a 230 meter square at the base. We ended up using over 2 million blocks of stone, which I could believe after working with all the materials. The pyramid was built to face true north, south, eat, and west and we even made the entrances facing north because we felt like direction was important. I helped to build the pyramid at Giza, but I could not take the toil any longer once we finished. I was hurting badly and many of the other workers were having back problems which hindered us to work on future projects. When we were done I was so relieved to see how much the hard work paid off; it was a huge beautiful structure that we were very excited to celebrate the completion. Since I worked everyday all day on the pyramid I understood the work and patience it took to build it along with many others.
References:
Dr. Christopher L.C.E. Wircombe, "Seven Wonders of the Ancient World", http://ce.eng.usf.edu/pharos/wonders
Dr. Zahi Hawass, "Pyramid", http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/pyramid
James Frederick Edwards, "Building the Great Pyramid," Technology and Culture, 2003, vol. 44: 340-354
The Great Pyramid of Giza- in the city of Giza, built in the Fourth Dynasty around 2560 BC for King Khufu (Cheops), only surviving of the Seven Ancient Wonders
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Author's Note:
I used a variety of sources which allowed me to see a view from many perspectives in order to put the whole together. I used what people thought about the time period in order to portray the mindset and characteristics of the ancient time of building the pyramid. I used the sources I found in order to paraphase the information I found into the life of a worker at the time of the building of The Great Pyramid of Giza.